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Word is RJ is getting $8m guaranteed plus $5m in incentives.
First, the Dbacks don't have $8m, unless they trade Eric Byrnes for Hackensack
The most they could probably scrape up for another starting pitcher is $2-3M
And second, the Dbacks have a team policy against giving incentives in contracts
So they couldn't have come close to matching the Giants offer anyhow

Seriously? The Giants were the ONLY team being bruited about as a likely landing spot for RJ. And Sabean all but came right out and said "he's ours" in an interview a few days ago. This doesn't surprise me at all.

Wow, how did Sabean suddenly get so smart? What a screaming good deal for the Giants...

He benefited from the fact that RJ wanted to stay as close to AZ as possible, and preferred the National League. That really only left LA, SD and SF. (Maybe HOU, I dunno.) Seeing as how SD is wearing a barrel for clothing right now and Ned Coletti is also seemingly forbidden from adding too much payroll, SF is the natural landing place.

The shame is that, unless my rumors are mixed up, RJ came to the D-Backs offering to take a 50% pay cut right off the bat. Even then they supposedly still didn't have enough money. Pennywise, pound foolish. Or rather: blame the Eric Byrnes extension. Stupid owners!

Lot of talk about SF publicizing Johnson's quest for 300 wins like Bonds' HR record. Am I the only one who looks at the Giants' offense and thinks that if Randy's trying to make it to 300, he should have signed a 2-year deal?

The Giants have a better offense than the Diamondbacks do now. Their short stops were brutal last year (3 of them under a 45 OPS+), and Renteria is a huge offensive upgrade by comparison. The Diamondbacks have a significant downgrade at second base, and even though Dunn only played 44 games for them he was by far their best hitter. My guess is the Giants offense has been upgraded to mediocre, while the Diamondbacks have been downgraded to terrible.

The Giants have a better offense than the Diamondbacks do now. Their short stops were brutal last year (3 of them under a 45 OPS+), and Renteria is a huge offensive upgrade by comparison. The Diamondbacks have a significant downgrade at second base, and even though Dunn only played 44 games for them he was by far their best hitter. My guess is the Giants offense has been upgraded to mediocre, while the Diamondbacks have been downgraded to terrible.

Geez, exaggerate much?
Don't get me wrong, I wanted the Dbacks to re-sign RJ more than any other Dbacks fan out there (no, that's not an exaggeration). But what's done is done. The Dbacks are about as good now as they were at the start of last season, arguably better. And that team won 82 games despite a crappy bullpen. The Giants, despite their moves, are still the 4th best team in the NL West.

My guess is the Giants offense has been upgraded to mediocre, while the Diamondbacks have been downgraded to terrible.

Giants will be a bit better offensively, but I don't know if they're quite mediocre yet. I would expect worse offense from Lewis, Winn, and Molina and their only clear upgrade is Renteria (offensively, gives most of it back defensively). They'll also get less production from 2B, where Durham had a solid year at the plate for 2/3rds of the season.

Yes, the Dbacks lose Hudson and Dunn. But they should get better production from Upton, Jackson, and Byrnes (big time). I still think Chris Young is going to put up a fluke monster season one of these years. Reynolds could also bust out. Arizona may be slightly below average offensively (although it's far from certain given how most of their hitters are in their mid-20s). But there's no question that the Dbacks have a superior lineup to the Giants, as rosters are currently constructed.

A trade based around Adam Lind for Jonathan Sanchez seems to make sense for both clubs at this point. The Jays have an OF of Snider/Wells/Rios for awhile with Cooper likely to take Overbay's spot at 1B and the Giants have control of Lincecum/Cain/Zito with Bumgarner/Alderson creeping closer. Thoughts?

It's not the worst trade idea that I've ever heard. The projections for Lind are all over the map. James projects .300/.349/.494, while CHONE 50th percentile comes in at .275/.328/.447 (the more optimistic James line is around 75th percentile). Lind seems to be a below average defensive left fielder as well.

If its the second line, then that looks a lot like what we can expect from Schierholtz, who is a better defender than Lind. The Giants already have an surplus, mediocre offensive corners with better gloves (Lewis, Winn, Schierholtz), so I'm not seeing where Lind would represent much of an upgrade once you factor in defense.

It could be that the Giants would be better off trading for Lind and trading away both Winn and Lewis (in unrelated deals) and then start Schierholtz in RF and Lind in LF. That would certainly increase the power in the lineup, at the expense of defense. But I'm pretty sure that Sabean is committed to both his mediocre corners for 2008, so the odds of him trading for Lind are pretty minimal.

I'm not going to argue with this, just say a few things - he definitely looks shaky out there at times, but for the most part he rarely makes mistakes out there, and the Fielding Bible actually had him as a good LF in 2007 (sample size alert?).

And while it's a shame that the Giants are locked into Randy Winn for 9m this year, having him and Fred Lewis around is a terrible reason to not pursue a hitter who may flourish at the big league level. Fred Lewis will never hit enough to be a corner OF, and Winn is 35 with one decent season out of the last 6. They do not represent reasons to stay away from Lind. Winn could always be platooned with Lind until the trade deadline, when a playoff team would be willing to add Winn to their bench for a couple of months. This trade would set the Giants up nicely for 2010-2012 with an OF of Lind/Rowand/Schierholtz.

If they could do better then fine, but I doubt they can get a better package than Lind and say Davis Romero (or another of one of Toronto's many arms) for Sanchez.

Just to clarify, I'd be interested in Lind-for-Sanchez if I were the GM. I just don't expect that Sabean will be.

Also, I agree 100% that Lewis and Winn are inferior hitters for corner outfielders. But Sabean likes having a great defensive outfield, which Lewis/Rowand/Winn provides (although probably not as good as Sabean may think it is).

Anyway, about 5-6 years ago I resigned myself to the fact that Sabean makes most of his personnel decisions based on his gut, not any sort of objective analysis. Occasionally he's been right, but most of the time he's been wrong. Regardless, there's not much point in beating the dead horse about Sabean's deficiencies--he is what he is, and no amount of complaining is going to change what he does. Hopefully the Giants can contend in a weak division in 2009 despite their incompetent management.

And while it's a shame that the Giants are locked into Randy Winn for 9m this year, having him and Fred Lewis around is a terrible reason to not pursue a hitter who may flourish at the big league level. Fred Lewis will never hit enough to be a corner OF, and Winn is 35 with one decent season out of the last 6.

BPro had Winn 5.7 runs above the positional average for RF offensively, before adding in non SB / CS baserunning. For baserunning, he was +5.8 runs.

In 2007, they had Winn at 3.3 runs above the average RF offensively. For baserunning, 0.5 runs.

James projects .300/.349/.494, while CHONE 50th percentile comes in at .275/.328/.447 (the more optimistic James line is around 75th percentile).

Historically, James' projections have been wildly optimistic for every hitter. IIRC, whoever projects in James' name, projects a league where the hitters score about 0.5-0.75 R/G than the pitchers allow.

I'm not going to argue with this, just say a few things - he definitely looks shaky out there at times, but for the most part he rarely makes mistakes out there, and the Fielding Bible actually had him as a good LF in 2007 (sample size alert?).

After watching him this season, I'm inclined to believe that the Fielding Bible's ranking is a result of a small sample - he only had about half a season out there. Really, while he's not historically bad, he just doesn't look like a good fielder. Of course, that's only based on my eyes, and not any real analysis.

The Dbacks are about as good now as they were at the start of last season, arguably better. And that team won 82 games despite a crappy bullpen. The Giants, despite their moves, are still the 4th best team in the NL West.

The Diamondbacks won 82 games last season and are losing 180+ innings of 117 ERA+ pitching, 4 months of Orlando Hudson, 2 months of Adam Dunn, and their best setup man. A full year of Scherzer will help but this team won't be as good as it was last year. They might win as many or more games but that's because the Giants are the only team in the division that is trying to improve. The NL West was a really bad division last year and is getting worse.

Where is this coming from? I was not aware that it makes any difference whether the players are offered arbitration. There's a limit of four type A/B signings per team this year; you can exceed that limit if you also lose some A/B free agents.

I have seen the "this is the last FA team X can sign because of the limit on subset Y of FAs per team" thing mentioned at least five times here and elsewhere, and I have yet to see the assertion stand. Either the person recants on their own or others point out why it's mistaken. Can we put a moratorium on the claim until we figure out exactly what the rules are this offseason? To be fair, before the FA period started, I had zero idea anything like this was happening.

Where is this coming from? I was not aware that it makes any difference whether the players are offered arbitration.

It doesn't, I don't believe - just if they're Type A or Type B, according to the CBA (page 86 of the PDF file; page 74 if you go by the written page numbers):

(a) Clubs shall be limited in the number of Type A and B Players,
as defined below, they may subsequently sign to contracts. The
number of signings permitted shall be related to the number of Players
electing free agency under this Section B.
...
There shall be no restrictions on the number of
unranked Players that a Club may sign to contracts.

(b) Irrespective of the provisions of subparagraph (a) above, a
Club shall be eligible to sign at least as many Type A and B Players
as it may have lost through Players having become free agents under
this Section at the close of the season just concluded.

Re: trading Jonathan Sanchez
The Giants have no one to take Jonathan Sanchez's rotation spot. If they're trading him to get better offensively they're likely plugging the fifth spot in the rotation with replacement or sub-replacement garbage.